Confrontations
by SweetSinger2010
Summary: Years before they commanded the Ghost's crew, Kanan and Hera were young, fired up, and very much attracted to each other. The time they spent traveling alone together was never, ever dull. A collection of Kanera one-shots and vignettes, pre-Rebels.
1. Green-Eyed Monster

A/N: So, last weekend, I read _New Dawn_ , which was a pretty decent book detailing Hera and Kanan's first adventure/mission together. Y'all…they were so young when they met. Roughly eighteen and twenty-two, respectively, and we know they traveled alone together for a few years. Can you imagine what it was like, just the two of them cruising around, not yet grown into the Space Parents we know and love today? I can. So here I present a collection of one-shots and vignettes, ever-growing. At the beginning of each, I'll tell how long they've known each other. R&R!

* * *

Green-Eyed Monster

 _Time Elapsed: Eight Weeks_

* * *

Hera Syndulla was mature, principled, clever, and a prodigiously skilled pilot but she was, at the end of the day, only eighteen years old. And eighteen wasn't old enough for any being, regardless of species or creed, to be able to fully understand the complicated intricacies of relationships.

Take her relationship with Kanan Jarrus, for example.

She'd met him on Gorse just two months ago and she was crazy about him. Oh, she was good at hiding it, ignoring it, pushing her commitment to the Rebellion ahead of her feelings, but she knew there was something about that mysterious, infuriating man that made her feel she had found her place in the galaxy. She thought that maybe, _maybe_ he shared some of the same sentiments? She'd seen it in his eyes from time to time. (Right?) But docking at a shady spaceport on Akiva and going out for the evening proved to be an education to the contrary. She cursed all the cantinas in the galaxy, and cursed Kanan's penchant for drinking especially.

Hera studied her reflection and was horrified by what she saw: smudged, cakey eye makeup, bleary eyes, feathered traces of yesterday's garish lipstick, and an impossibly tight dress that just _barely_ covered everything it needed to.

She was completely mortified. Really, had _all_ dignity died with the freedom of Ryloth?

This was the worst part: she wasn't looking in a mirror.

There was no reflection.

There was only a woman— _another Twi'lek woman!_ —strolling through the ship's common room, looking like she was about to speak.

 _Please, no_ , Hera thought bleakly. She sat, still pajama clad at zero-seven-thirty, with one leg propped up against the side of the dejarik table, the other stretched out on the curved bench. She felt exposed wearing only a pair of shorts and a t-shirt. Both garments were short and thinly woven, leaving plenty of skin visible to the stranger. She thought about jumping up and running to get dressed, but why _shouldn't_ she wear her own pajamas on her own ship?

The Other Woman continued to approach with an overly-friendly smile. Hera made no room for her on the bench. She didn't even set her cup of caf aside. If The Woman, a fellow Twi'lek, had any sense at all, she'd have been able to take one look at the position of Hera's lekku and the arch of her eyebrows and interpret her body language for what it was: all but openly hostile.

The Woman lacked sense as much as she lacked tasteful clothing, clearly. She continued to approach Hera and then leaned over her as if preparing to share a great secret. "Your friend _really_ knows how to show a girl a good time." The stench of several kinds of alcohol was heavy on her breath.

Hera suddenly found herself feeling nauseated, and not just because of the smell. "My _friend_ ," she repeated, acid dripping from the word, "doesn't know when he's had too much to drink." She paused, gauging The Woman before adding mercilessly, "You're not his first 'guest' this week."

Now, that was a bald-faced and petty lie, one which Hera knew was beneath her to tell. She didn't care.

The Woman only smirked and she straightened, swinging her hips as she walked away. "Jealous, honey?"

Hera smiled a lethal smile and her eyes narrowed. "You can show yourself out." Her tone said, _Go kriff yourself._

Oh, wait—Kanan already had.

An aggravated noise scraped the back of Hera's throat. She ran her finger along the rim of her mug, watching how the motion created ripples on the liquid surface inside. _"Jealous, honey?"_ She mocked in a syrupy voice.

Chopper wheeled by just then and gave a very vocal and opinionated answer to that question. Hera flushed, scooting across the bench so she could ram her heel against his dome.

"I'm going to shove you back into the socket of that old Y-wing and solder you there!" she said hotly. He sniggered at her, making several rude gestures with his manipulators. "Deviant," she muttered.

He rolled away, unoffended, whistling and warbling as he headed to—where, exactly? Hera frowned. She was of half a mind to adjust his programming. That droid clearly thought himself to have the run of the ship.

Chopper and Kanan passed each other in the doorway and the droid cackled again. Hera felt along the back of the bench and found a spare bolt. She hurled it at the droid, fuming.

Kanan's eyebrows rose just a fraction, amused that Chopper was already on Hera's last nerve at zero-eight-hundred. "What'd he do now?"

"He knows what he did," Hera said, loudly enough that Chopper could certainly hear. "Just being his usual awful self."

Kanan shook his head and snorted. "No surprise there."

 _Oh, but there were plenty of surprises_ _ **here**_ _earlier_ , Hera though sourly. She quickly rearranged her expression into something passive, if not pleasant. There was a beat of silence and she noticed Kanan's eyes following the curves of her smooth, long legs. Heat prickled on the back of her neck for all kinds of reasons, but she kept her face carefully blank.

"Caf?" She asked, motioning with her mug.

He smiled, pleasantly surprised by the offer. "Sure."

She smiled sweetly in return, getting up. She let him walk ahead of her to the galley so he couldn't see how she rolled her eyes. He looked remarkably sober, she thought. He was dressed, neatly groomed, and alert. She thought maybe he looked a little tired, but not hungover. Weird—she knew he had, at least in the recent past, quite the love affair with alcohol.

"I didn't hear you come back last night," she said casually. She stood in front of the caf-brewer, getting it ready to brew another carafe. He leaned against the counter next to her, little space between them.

"Yeah," he said slowly. "You were already asleep when I got back." He rubbed his neck. "Around zero-one, I think."

"Mm," she acknowledged, nodding. She watched the caf drip into the carafe and reached above her head to get a mug for Kanan, tiptoeing. Doing this expanded the gap between the hem of her shirt and the waistband of her shorts. She continued talking as if she was totally unaware he was watching her intently. "I picked up a few things at the market and came back early myself. Talked to a few interesting locals." She turned her gaze up at him, peering through her eyelashes. "How was the bar scene?"

He swallowed. There it was! She had him trapped and he knew it. His eyes shifted warily. "Not that great," he hedged. "I'm thinking about laying off for a while."

Hera's eyebrows rose in genuine surprise. "Oh, really?" She poured him a cup of caf and handed it to him. Her tone must have been sharper than intended, because he eyed the caf suspiciously and took a careful sip.

"Thanks," he said. She turned so that her hip pressed against the counter. Bodies nearly brushing, she studied his profile.

"You didn't make any friends, then?" She asked innocently.

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye, and then flashed a grin before bringing his caf up to his mouth. "I don't need friends. I have _you_."

Such a smooth line may have worked on other women, but not on Hera Syndulla. Her eyes flashed dangerously.

"Sleemo!" She spat, face darkening. She punched him in the arm— _hard._

He was mid-sip when she hit him and hot caf sloshed out of the cup, baptizing his beard. " _Ow!_ "

He scrambled to set down the caf and wipe his face. His skin was red and mottled where it'd burned him. "What gives? What's the matter with you?" He shouted, incensed.

She glared, eyes narrow. "'I don't need friends. I have _you_ ,'" she mimicked his simpering tone. She muttered something in Ryl and shoved her way past him.

Or tried to.

His hand shot out and caught her by the waist. He drew himself up to full height in front of her, placing himself between her and the door. Hera, nonplussed, stood toe-to-toe with him, knowing she wouldn't be able to get past him without hitting him again. He knew it, too.

" _Don't._ "

Hera huffed and struck her signature I'm-incredibly-annoyed stance: weight thrown to one side, hand on the opposite hip. "Will you please move?"

"I will not 'please move!' Will _you_ please tell me what's got you like this?"

"What's 'got me like this' is _you_!"

" _HOW?_ " He demanded, patience seeping away. "I've seen you for all of ten minutes today!"

"Sorry," she said sharply, not sorry at all. "Not _you_ , then, but your overnight guest."

That threw him off balance. "W-what?"

" _That tramp you spent the night with on my ship._ " She couldn't believe she was having to spell it out for him.

"Oh, _her_?" The confusion on Kanan's face cleared instantly. "Listen—"

"I will not," she interrupted, jabbing a finger in his chest, " _You_ listen. I thought we had an understanding about what it is we're doing here, but if you're only interested in carousing and cavorting, I can drop you off back on Gorse and let you take your chances there." She spoke in a rush, color rising. "To be frank, I thought there was more to you than that."

To Hera's eternal surprise, Kanan paused a moment before responding to her verbal beratement. "You're right; there is more to me than that," he said evenly. "Joining your little crusade against the Empire reminded me of that."

She regarded him warily. In the time she'd known Kanan, he'd always been honest, but not exactly open. This was new territory.

He continued. "I went out last night looking for a little fun," he admitted, "but I didn't find it." A look of disgust crossed his face. "What I _did_ find was a woman who'd been drugged by some sleemo slipping something in her drink. I played the part of admirer to get her out of there—she was gonna get herself taken advantage of. I can't _stand_ that kind of thing. Saw it too much on Gorse and other places."

Hera suddenly felt very small and foolish. "I forgot you were a bartender," she murmured. "So you brought her back to the _Ghost_ —"

"Where she slept in one of the empty cabins," he finished. "I didn't think she'd be awake before I had a chance to tell you. Sorry." He smiled at her, roguish again. "Besides, she wasn't my type."

Hera let the comment pass. "I owe you an apology," she said, contrite.

He waved a hand. "Keep that in mind next time I do something you don't like."

"Well," she shifted uncomfortably, pulling her shirt down to cover _all_ of her middle, "I should go get dressed."

He turned to let her pass, touching her hand as she did so. "Hey."

Her answering glance was guarded, but she didn't pull away from his touch. "What?"

"I've always known the _Ghost_ was a one-woman ship, Hera." His eyes searched hers and her heart started beating oddly.

She smiled up at him. "Good."


	2. About A Cat

A/N: I've got a whole bunch of prompts for this fic saved on my phone, so I'll write them as I have time and energy. In this one, our Space Parents have known each other almost a couple years; long enough to know each other pretty well and flirt a lot, but Kanan in particular hasn't opened up all the way. Hope you like!

* * *

About A Cat

 _Time Elapsed: Twenty-Two Months_

* * *

Kanan and Hera had been arguing that morning, so when he lost a game of Sabacc in one of Kothal's cantinas, he knew she wasn't feeling any sympathy for him. They walked together back to where the _Ghost_ was docked in the spaceport, but she stayed a couple of paces ahead of him, arms crossed to show her displeasure. He read her signals loud and clear.

"Never coming back to this planet again," he mumbled, trying to start a conversation, breaking a strained silence.

"You should've known better than to bet that much with an awful hand like you had," she returned sharply. She was using the motherly, know-all tone that never failed to rub him the wrong way.

He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying so hard not to lose his temper with her. "It's not my fault! The guy was cheating."

"Some Jedi _you_ are." She stopped and turned in front of him. "Isn't the Force supposed to give you clarity or something?"

" _Hera_ ," he hissed, eyes darting nervously. He caught her by the arm. Being a Jedi was something he struggled to talk about in private, let alone on a very public street on an Empire-controlled world. Fortunately, no one seemed to have heard her. " _Clarity_ ," he finally replied, seething. "Not _clairvoyance._ "

She shook him off, but stood her ground. "It was a stupid waste of money!"

"'Stupid waste of money.' That's rich coming from the woman who wants to get a kriffing tooka-cat!"

One eyebrow arched. "Really? You want to revisit that _now_?"

He mirrored her defensive stance. "I'm just saying."

She snorted derisively and he knew they were about to argue again, right there in the middle of the street.

"Why is it stupid to want a pet—"

"You already have _Chopper_ —"

" _I_ think it would be nice to have just a small—"

"— and he's more high-maintenance than any animal—"

"—sweet tooka—"

"— _Sweet!_ Hera, they're temperamental, needy, aggravating—"

She stopped at his last remark. "Sorry, are we talking about _you_ now?"

Her eyes were innocently wide and Kanan hated himself for finding her incredibly attractive in that moment. " _We don't need a cat_ ," he ground out through clenched teeth.

She started to glare, but then her expression cleared. Kanan knew that didn't bode well for him. "You know what?" she said slowly. "This shouldn't even be up for debate. It's _my_ ship we're living on, after all. I only ever asked for your opinion, and I certainly don't need your permission."

He should have let it drop, he should have let the argument end right there. He knew that. His Jedi training and common sense told him that sometimes it was more important to keep the peace than to have the last word. _You're right, Hera, my apologies_ is what he should have said. But what he said was: "Yes you do."

And he said it with a laugh that made her cheeks darken.

"I'm sorry?" She was giving him the opportunity to pry his foot out of his mouth. He didn't take it.

"Yes, you do," he repeated slowly, letting his voice drop. Her eyes widened.

"And why," she asked archly, "is that?"

He drew close to her and leaned in so that his mouth just barely touched hers. "You know why," he murmured against her skin. _Because you're as crazy about me as I am about you_ , he thought. He heard her breath catch in her throat. When she didn't pull away, he took that as a good sign.

She stood on tip-toe, leaning on him as she whispered in his ear, "You're absolutely right, Kanan."

Her voice sent a chill up his spine. His hands found her waist. People were starting to stare at them, but he didn't really care. "Is that so?"

"Mhmm." She ran the backs of her fingers along his jawline for a moment and then—

And then she threw her elbow in his gut and he doubled over, choking, the wind knocked out of him.

"You're right—we _don't_ need a cat! I still have my hands full with the _last_ stray I took in!" She was _this close_ to shouting.

"I—was not—a stray," he coughed, face red. He braced his palms on his knees and looked up to find that she was walking away. "Where are you going?"

She threw up a hand, not bothering to turn around or answer him.

Kanan groaned, straightening. He briefly debated whether or not he should follow her, but he decided that would be the kiss of death at this point. Better to head back to the _Ghost_ , he thought.

"Son, that woman is out of your league," a voice said from behind him. Kanan turned to see an older man staring after Hera, a knowing look on his face.

"Let me tell you," Kanan said wryly, "that woman is in a league entirely her own."

* * *

There was no reason for Kanan to be sitting on the ship's ramp except that he was starting to worry; it was nearly sundown and Hera wasn't back. He hadn't heard any blasters or TIEs flying overhead, so he figured that was good. A sigh buzzed through his lips. Someday he'd learn to bite his tongue instead of arguing with her, but clearly not today. He tried not to think of how brilliantly green her eyes looked when she was angry, or how nice it felt to have her standing so close earlier, pressed against him…

Well—it _had_ been nice until she sucker-punched him. He rubbed the tender spot on his abdomen where her elbow had landed. Whoever taught her to fight had done a good job.

"Sorry about that."

Kanan looked. Hera was approaching and she looked almost repentant, which immediately put him on guard.

"I've had worse," he said as she walked up the ramp and sat beside him, a small basket held carefully in her arms. "You were gone a long time."

"We both needed to cool off," she said, rubbing the back of her neck. "And I was looking for meiloorun. Did you know there's not a single one on all of Lothal?"

"I did know that, actually. I _told_ you to get some when we were in the Ryloth sector last month—"

"I know," she sighed, not even sounding annoyed by his veiled I-told-you-so. Her eyes shifted to the basket in her lap.

"Hera," he said suspiciously, prompting her.

She gave him a pained, apologetic look. "I promise I didn't do this out of spite."

"Do wh—" He was suddenly interrupted by a very small, very feeble mewling sound. "That isn't what I think it is." His eyes narrowed. "Right?"

"I heard crying in an alley. I couldn't just leave it there," Hera said by way of explanation. She reached in the basket and scooped out the tiniest, scrawniest tooka-kitten he'd ever seen. She cradled it against her chest with one hand. It fit easily in her palm. She reached back in the basket with her other hand, procuring a baby blanket and a bottle of bantha-milk. She looked at Kanan pleadingly.

He rolled his eyes so far back he was seeing new dimensions. Hera gently wrapped the kitten in the blanket and it wriggled, mewling again. Kanan leaned over to look at the poor thing in spite of himself. He touched its downy head with one finger. "I think it's sick, Hera," he cautioned.

"You don't know that," she said defensively. She stroked the kitten's belly gently. Her touch seemed to soothe it.

"I felt it," he said before he could stop himself. Where did _that_ come from? Master Billaba's smiling face swam in his mind's eye. He shook his head.

Hera looked at him questioningly. "You felt it?"

"All beings are connected through the living Force," he said slowly. He hesitated to continue. His old beliefs tasted foreign on his tongue. Yet talking about the Force still felt as natural to him as…as sitting close to Hera.

She gave him a soft, encouraging smile. "Go on."

He rubbed his palms on his thighs. Why was he doing this? "Every being, every creature has a unique presence in the Force. It's like closing your eyes in a crowded room and hearing one person's laugh or…when I walk into the _Ghost's_ cockpit and I know you've been there because I can smell your perfume. It's like that." He looked sideways at her and he felt heat creep up his neck when she wordlessly twined their fingers together. "When you know how to connect to another being through the Force, you get a sense of who that person or being is, what they feel. _Your_ presence is like a white-hot sun, brilliant." He felt her steadfast gaze on him, and his flush deepened. "And this little tooka," he reached over to pet its head again, sighing, "is like a falling shadow. It's in pain."

Hera gnawed her lower lip, digesting everything, wanting to hear more, but not wanting to push him. "You continually surprise me, Kanan Jarrus," she said softly.

He cleared his throat, surprised just as much as she. He had spent years resisting the Force, burying the memories of his Jedi days; opening himself back up to it now made him feel vulnerable. Enough of _that_ for one day. "Yeah, well, I aim to please."

It was Hera's turn to roll her eyes. "Aaand he's back: the man I met on Gorse."

"Nice." He held out his hands for the bundled tooka-kitten. "Here, let me hold it."

Hera gently handed him the kitten. "Him," she corrected. "The kitten is a 'him,' not an 'it.'"

"That's one step closer to naming it," Kanan said with a warning edge in his voice. "You _can't_ name it, Hera." By the look on her face, he knew he correctly guessed where her next thought was headed. "It's dying—it doesn't have long."

"But he doesn't have to die alone and unloved," she persisted stubbornly. She rested her temple on his shoulder and he guessed it was a tactic to wear him down. It worked, of course.

"Kyber," he said grudgingly. "We can call him Kyber."

"Like the crystal?"

"Yeah."

"I like it." She shifted her head on his shoulder and he laid his cheek on the top of her head. She was warm and he found it oddly comforting. "Will you sit up with me until…until Kyber doesn't need us anymore?" She asked.

"Yes," he said, and he wasn't even that sour about it. They settled into silence, leaning comfortably on each other. This definitely wasn't how he pictured the day ending, considering they'd been at each other's throats earlier. How was it that Hera both infuriated and enchanted him even after nearly two years of traveling together?

In truth, Kanan was in love with Hera. He just wasn't ready yet to articulate that or even admit it to himself. For the moment, he was content with just sitting and talking with her.

"Have I ever told you the story of how I saw my master stop to save a tooka-cat during a skirmish on Kardoa?"

Hera took a sharp breath; he almost _never_ talked about his master or the Clone Wars or any of it. "No," she said. "Do you want to?"

"Yeah," he said, realizing he did. Maybe this was what healing felt like.


	3. Hera's First Time

A/N: All riiiiight, I had issues getting this uploaded. Sorry if you got spammed with alerts. This one's short. I'm kind of on a roll with these because I love Kanan and Hera and they're fun to write. Good luck to those of you who are studying for finals and things. You're gonna make it!

* * *

Confrontations

 _Hera's First Time_

 _Time Elapsed: Five and a half standard days_

* * *

Hera fell back. Her breathing was heavy, her body shaking form the intensity of what they'd just experienced. Beside her, Kanan was very still.

He had to clear his throat before he could speak. He looked sideways at her. "That was…wow."

"Yeah."

He laughed shakily. "I have to admit, I was worried for a second. Wasn't sure how that was gonna go."

Hera was starting to recover her wits. She turned to him, eyes glinting. "I _told_ you there'd be some tight maneuvering."

"Some!" He choked, incredulous. "You said _some_! You didn't say there'd be a whole squadron of TIE fighters on our tail!"

Hera shifted her seat, flexing her fingers on the Ghost's controls. "Well thank goodness you were as good at gunning as you claimed to be," she said curtly. Adrenaline was fading and the slight quaver in her voice betrayed her strain. She hoped he wouldn't pick up on that.

He did.

"You didn't know, did you?" He demanded, eyes wide with the realization. "You had no idea what we were in for when you agreed to pull this mission."

Hera flushed, but she knew she couldn't argue. "Striking a convoy that large was a first for me," she acknowledged, mumbling.

"Your first time." Kanan reiterated blankly. "I thought you were supposed to be some kind of ace pilot!"

"You thought right!" She shot back. Her lekku twitched in agitation. "You're _alive_ aren't you? Next time I'll know how to do it _better_."

He gave a low whistle. _Next time?_ His face spoke for itself. "Hey, how old are you, anyway? I think I have a right to know if my captain is completely green, figuratively speaking."

Hera was good and annoyed. "Isn't it a little late to be asking that? You've been on my crew for almost a week now."

"Yeah, but if we run into trouble like that again, I'll be lucky to make it to two!"

She crossed her arms. "Eighteen."

" _Eighteen!_ " He gasped. He struggled to wrap his mind around that. At eighteen, he'd been perpetually hungover and doing his best just to get by. "What are you, a runaway?"

That visibly struck a nerve. "I'm _not_ a runaway. I left home," she growled, deadly quiet, "because the galaxy needs people to stand up for it."

"And you fit the bill?"

"And I fit the bill." Her voice bordered on unstable, angry. "Question my ability again and you _won't_ make it two weeks!"

He touched two fingers to his brow in mock-salute. "Aye, Captain Syndulla!"

Then his mouth fell open.

Hera sighed when she saw the look on his face; she knew where this was going. "Oh, no," she muttered.

"Wait a minute— _Syndulla._ Like Cham Syndulla, the Liberator of Ryloth? Why didn't I realize that _before_?"

"Would it have changed your mind about coming with me?" She challenged. Her brows were arched high.

"It might! Your father's a fanatic—everyone knows that! How do I know you're—"

"I'm _nothing_ like him!" She rebuked sharply. Her face was dark and dangerous. "I got where I am on my own."

"Well, this is good," he said sarcastically, "I'm hooked with a pilot who has daddy issues and isn't old enough to drink in half the civilized systems out here. Terrific."

Hera opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again. "We're both tense," she said in a tightly-controlled voice, "and saying things we don't mean won't be good for anyone's nerves." She unhooked her restraints, pushing up out of the pilot's seat. "If you'll excuse me, I'll be in the engine room."

Kanan blinked. "That's it? You're passing on the opportunity to jab back and pick at _my_ issues?"

She stopped in the door way and turned. Her expression was absolutely patronizing. "Oh, sweetheart, I doubt we have the time."


	4. Target Practice

A/N: As per Chewbacca shooting Kylo Ren, I'm assuming that blaster wounds can bleed. Getting kind of liberal with science and medicine here; I was a music major in college and got straight Cs in biology and I was pretty ok with that. Bear with me. This fic brought to you by: caffeine, undying love for Kanera, an idea birthed during the writing of my last oneshot "Wounds," and a few words of dialogue I pilfered from the animated "Beauty and the Beast." Enjoy this mess if you can.

* * *

Target Practice

 _Time Elapsed: Twenty Months_

Things were not going according to plan.

Hera lay low against a rooftop, peering over the ledge and into the alley below. She and Kanan were on a back-water world trying to steal a shipment of Imperial torpedoes and so, it seemed, was everyone else. About seven different beings from three rivaling crews all converged on the crate the same time Kanan did, and he, vastly outnumbered, was not doing well. People were starting to draw blasters and it was easy to see that if anyone was going to be eliminated first, it would be him.

But a Devaronian started shouting at a Sullustan and one shot the other, and that started a total melee. Hera bit her lip anxiously, watching as Kanan expertly fired his weapon, dodging blast after blast as he sought cover behind a stack of shipping pallets. She was at once annoyed and relieved that he wasn't using his lightsaber; doing so would have given him a better defense, but it most certainly would have made him the center of attention.

The center of attention was not where he needed to be, but that was exactly where he ended up when a barrage of blaster fire disintegrated the pallets he was hiding behind and the remaining beings started shooting at him. He threw himself to the ground in a roll, and by the time he came up, Hera made a calculated decision.

She had to take him out of the equation. It was the only way to save his life. Her blaster was in her hands, and she steadied them on the ledge. Kanan was ducking again, blaster bolts zinging over his head. She needed him to stand so that she could take her shot. She was about seventy-five percent sure she could hit him without killing him, but not from this angle.

She needed him to remember she was up there. Shouting at him was completely out of the question. She looked at him, willing him to turn around and look up and see her. _Kanan,_ she thought desperately, _look at me._ And by some miracle, he shot up and turned toward her, eyes locking on hers. She was already taking aim. _Trust me, love._

She knew that he did. Without hesitating, she squeezed the trigger and watched, helpless, as he went down.

* * *

He was bleeding. He was burned and bleeding and there was a blaster wound on his side, a pretty big one. And it was all Hera's fault. At least she was trying to make it right. She'd dragged him to the _Ghost's_ small medbay and started to patch him up. There were several scenarios wherein he'd imagined the alluring Twi'lek stripping his shirt off and running her hands on his bare skin, but this definitely was not one of them. Not even close.

She leaned over him now, something concealed behind her back. Her eyes held a mixture of uncertainty and determination. "Just…hold still," she said. Her tone was apologetic.

"What— _ouch!_ " Kanan sucked in a breath when Hera touched him with gauze and disinfectant. "That _hurts_!" He jerked, trying to sit up and get away, but she was faster than him. She hopped up on the bed and pinned him there, her knee on his chest. There was no way for him to throw her off now without hurting them both. He doubted he could do it at any rate; he was feeling worse by the second.

Hera's mouth was tight and her eyes flashed. "If you'd hold _still_ , it wouldn't hurt as much!"

He turned his head on the pillow, refusing to look at her. "Guess I don't have much of a choice!"

She lithely maneuvered herself back to the ground and a standing position. She swung an arm toward the door. "If you want to go to your room and sulk and bleed to death, be my guest!"

He blinked. Bleed to death? He picked his head up just enough to take a look at his side. There wasn't much to see except blood, and a lot of it. Everywhere. He looked at Hera; she was paler than he'd ever seen her, and her hands and the front of her jumpsuit were stained and damp with blood. A sudden panic gripped him. "Hey, none of that is yours, is it?"

"No," she said, face softening. "Twi'leks don't bleed red anyway, you know that. Lie back."

He complied and she touched the gauze to his skin again and dabbed gently along the length of the wound. His vision started to swim and blinding pain muddied his senses. Hera was talking to him, but he couldn't make sense of a single syllable. He only heard the rise and fall and rich timbre of her words. The sound was soothing, though, and it made him remember how much he was in love with her. The first moment he ever heard her speak, he knew he'd follow her anywhere. Even to botched jobs and blaster wounds.

"Have I ever told you how beautiful your voice is, Hera?" His mouth moved without his mind's permission, and the words sounded slurred and uncertain even to his own ears, which were ringing loudly. His mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton.

Her eyebrows flew up. "No, and don't start now." She frowned, still looking at his wound. She swiped one hand across her forehead as the other very firmly held a clean patch of gauze to his side. Her lips pursed into a thin, worried line that made Kanan very nervous.

"What is it?"

Her eyes hesitated to meet his. "If you don't stop bleeding soon, we're going to be in real trouble."

Translation: he possibly really _was_ bleeding to death.

"'M not worried about it," he mumbled, closing his eyes to stop the ceiling from spinning. "You owe it to me to keep me alive since you're the one who shot me."

"I said I was _sorry_." She sighed, agitated. Her hands were on his skin again, and he liked how that felt, even though everything else felt terrible. One hand beneath his shoulder and the other at his hipbone, she helped him turn over on his good side. "Maybe that will take some of the pressure off and stop the bleeding," she murmured. But the tone of her voice said, _I don't know what else to do._

He grunted his acknowledgment, in too much pain to speak. His side felt hot and sticky, but the rest of him was _cold._ His muscles were tense and quivering. Hera's wrist brushed against his forehead.

"You're clammy," she said tightly. "I think you're in shock."

Did her voice break a little? That concerned him just as much as anything else. Hera Syndulla was almost never upset, unless it was _at_ him. But all he could manage to say was, "Cold."

"I know, love."

She was calling him 'love' now; another bad sign.

His back to Hera, he couldn't see anything now except the wall anyway, so he let his eyes close. His lids were so heavy. He fought for consciousness, afraid he'd never hear her voice again if he succumbed now. He listened to her every move and maybe she knew that he needed her to talk him through the pain, because that's exactly what she started doing.

"Alright," she said, slipping a scanning device onto his forefinger, "this baby is going to tell us how to help you." He heard her fingers tap against a datapad. There was a beat of silence. "Well congratulations! You've lost approximately seventeen percent of your blood volume." She took the scanner off his finger and started bustling around the medbay.

"That's bad," he grunted. Seventeen percent sounded like a whole lot and his already-rapid pulse started to climb even higher from sheer anxiety. He couldn't make his teeth stop chattering.

"Not as bad as it could be," Hera said, sounding hopeful. "Most humanoids can lose up to thirty percent before a transfusion is necessary." She slipped an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose, securing an elastic band to fit snug around his head. "Here—breathe. You're going to be fine."

The oxygen made him feel dizzy, but it also helped clear the fog in his head, and Hera's sentences started catching up with him as his breathing evened out. "Wait," he said, swatting the mask aside, "Thirty percent? How do you know that?"

A slender green hand reached around to put the mask back on. "Um." She brushed his hair back from his forehead and he knew she was stalling.

"Hera?"

She started swabbing a patch of skin in the crook of his arm and then tied a tourniquet above his elbow. "I saw it on a show on the HoloNet."

He looked up and saw a bag of fluids hanging above his head. _Surely_ Hera didn't intend to hook him up to an IV. " _What_ show?" He demanded, voice cracking. "You're not talking about 'Belnar's Physiology,' right?" His words sounded like a weak, jumbled mess through the mask, but he knew that Hera understood him perfectly and chose to ignore him.

"You don't have anything to worry about; they say only the good die young."

He sputtered for a response and she chose that moment of vulnerability to plunge the IV catheter into his arm, ease the needle out, then tape the line in place. She unwound the tourniquet and he flexed his hand. The process had been very nearly painless. He didn't know why he was surprised she'd been able to do that with such skill; he'd seen her hands work wonders on the _Ghost_ and her touch had always been unfailingly gentle all the times she'd tended to his various other wounds. But starting an IV?

"Y-you didn't learn that f-from the HoloNet," he said, teeth chattering again. He knew his vital signs were stabilizing; breathing was coming easier and his heart had slowed, but he still felt so agonizingly cold. Hera sponging his skin with a cool cloth didn't help.

"Piloting wasn't the only thing I learned in my time with the resistance on Ryloth," she said distantly. He wished he could see her face. He was about to say so, but then she lifted the gauze over his wound and the rush of fresh air set him shivering violently.

"Finally!" Hera cried, sighing. The relief in her voice was almost palpable. "The bleeding stopped. You're going to be just fine, Kanan."

Her elation was contagious and he smiled despite the pain, but confusion made his brow furrow. "You said that earlier. Didn't you mean it?"

Her lips met his temple, then she covered his wound with a clean, thick bandage and taped it down. "I mostly meant it."

He swore, and not just because her fingers sliding across his ribs sent pain radiating everywhere. The shaking didn't help anything. "I m-might freeze to death, Hera," he said.

"Just a second." He heard her moving around and moments later, she draped a thermal blanket over him. He curled up as much as he could, greedy for every bit of warmth he could get. His lips parted with a relieved moan.

"If this is what shock feels like, I'm not a fan," he said, pulling the blanket tight around his shoulders. Between the effects of the oxygen, the IV, and the blanket, he was starting to feel a little less horrible.

"Your color's coming back," Hera said. She peered into his face. "Are you still cold?"

"No," he said, still shivering. Hera snorted.

"Right."

"It's getting better." That was a lie, but he didn't want Hera thinking he couldn't take a non-lethal blaster wound like a man. He heard her exhale in such a way that told him she was standing with her hands on her hips, eyes narrowed, thinking. He suddenly remembered she was covered in his blood. "You should go change."

"I'm going to," she said, a lilt in her voice. "But first, we need to get you warm."

"I _am_ warm…ish," he insisted, fighting against drooping eyelids. Drowsiness was taking over his senses. Hera was doing something, maybe cleaning up the blood or the scattered medical supplies; he couldn't tell. Suddenly, the edge of the blanket lifted and he gasped at the cold. Then the bed shifted and Hera stretched out next to him, pulling the blanket over them both. As she settled in, her back touched his, and it was bare. Completely bare.

"Before you start running your mouth," she said severely, "remember that the only other person on this ship available to direct your medical care is Chopper."

He didn't say anything, but not because he took her warning seriously. In the last hour, Hera had: skillfully and diligently treated his blaster wound, called him 'love,' kissed him, and now she was in bed with him, half naked. Maybe his feelings weren't quite as unrequited as he thought.

As interested as he was in seeing Hera's face, he was incredibly grateful that she'd decided to lay with her back to his. The heat from her skin radiated through him and his shivering stopped little by little. His muscles began to relax. "And to think I would have been happy with a second blanket," he said, recovering from his speechlessness. He cleared his throat, breath fogging in the oxygen mask. "Doctor Syndulla, is this medically necessary?"

Her silence was very telling. "Does it matter?"

"No."

"Just rest, Kanan," she said softly.

Exhausted, he didn't say anything else. He draped his arm over her hip, ignoring the pinch of pain from the IV catheter. She twined her fingers through his, and suddenly all pain was a distant memory. He intended to tell her that she could shoot him any day of the week if this was how she intended to make up for it, but he was lulled to sleep by the comfort of her closeness and the rhythmic steadiness of her breathing.

* * *

Hera jerked awake from a fitful dream, gasping and disoriented and alone. Hadn't she been right next to Kanan?

"Welcome back," he said. His voice came from across the room. She shifted her eyes and saw him sitting cross-legged on one of the other bunks, reclined against the wall. He was still shirtless and so, she realized, was she. She glanced down and was pleasantly surprised to find that she was fully covered by the thermal blanket. It was, in fact, tucked very neatly around her shoulders and chin.

"I promise I didn't peek." Kanan's mouth twitched. Hera sat up, careful to keep the blanket around her. She frowned at him.

"You should have woken me, Kanan." She rubbed her eyes; they felt unbelievably gritty. "How long was I asleep?"

"A few hours," he said. She just blinked. A few _hours_? She climbed out of the bunk, forcing her stiff knees and hips to move.

"How long have you been awake?" She asked, forehead wrinkling in concern. "Long enough to disconnect your IV and take a shower, I see."

His middle was no longer bloody, and he had changed into new trousers. His hair was neatly pulled back, still damp. A brand new bandage covered the blaster wound on his side. "You look better," she said, relieved to see that his face no longer held the sickly pallor of shock. She held her hands on her hips to keep him from seeing how they were trembling. She'd been calm earlier, laser-focused on keeping him alive, but she was quickly coming undone. "Kanan, I'm sorry—"

He shook his head. "You made the right call. I'd definitely be dead if one of those other guys had shot me. Besides," he paused, looking Hera up and down. She was immediately wary of the suggestive gleam in his eye. "Your bedside manner completely makes up for the fact that you used me as target practice. Or should I say _back_ side?"

Any lingering guilt over having to shoot him evaporated like moisture on a desert planet. She ignored the little fluttering thing her heart did when she remembered how she'd fallen asleep holding his hand and how natural it felt to lay so close to him. Today was not the day for trying to process complex things.

And she couldn't _stand_ that smug look on his face.

She locked eyes with Kanan as she walked over to the internal comm panel and activated it. "Chop," she said in a honeyed voice, "Come down to medical. Kanan's going to need help applying some anti-bac ointment and it needs done STAT. I'll be in the 'fresher. If the wound re-opens, let him bleed."


	5. The Dinner

A/N: I work a part-time job on Saturdays that often has a loooot of dead time. As a result, here's a little piece of fluff. It's a little different. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

The Dinner

 _Time Elapsed: Nine Months_

Humanoids were stupid and sentimental and C1-10P had very little use for all but exactly one and a half of them.

The one was Hera Syndulla, nineteen-year-old Twi'lek female from Ryloth. She had saved him from the burning wreckage of a Y-Wing fighter during the conflict the sentients referred to as "The Clone Wars." She had been responsible for his care and maintenance for more than a standard decade. She treated him kindly and called him Chopper.

The half was Kanan Jarrus, twenty-three-year-old human male from…where? Hera had taken him in on Gorse, that's all Chopper knew about it; perhaps that had been a rescue situation as well. _He_ didn't consider Kanan to be worth much, but Hera was obviously very fond. She displayed many of the biological indicators of romantic attraction whenever Kanan was near her, including dilated pupils, flushed skin, and accelerated respiration. It would have gone unnoticed by sentients because Hera was not one given to displays of romantic overture, but Chopper's circuitry was finely attuned to the Twi'lek woman. He was adept at decoding her various attitudes and physiological indicators. After all, he had observed over fifty percent of her life cycle thus far; she had been barely as tall as himself when she saved him on Ryloth, and now she stood over a meter-and-a-half tall and was a formidable pilot and hand-to-hand combatant.

She also had a formidable temper, which was why Chopper forced himself to consider Kanan Jarrus as roughly one half of the people he could tolerate associating with. Hera's instructions on that point had been exceptionally specific: Chopper, stop changing the ramp access code. Chopper, stop waking Kanan up at zero-five-hundred; _I_ don't even get up that early. Chopper, quit trying to lock Kanan in his cabin. Chopper, don't you _dare_ take Kanan's clothes while he's in the 'fresher! Don't ever let me catch you 'fixing' Kanan's blaster again, Chopper! C1-10P, if _anyone_ gets jettisoned from this ship, it's going to be _you_ if you don't quit trying to corner Kanan in the airlock! Watch your language, Chop, or I'm going to pull your battery out—that is _not_ how you're going to refer to Kanan.

To his satisfaction, Chopper noted that Hera often used that same tone of voice with Kanan: The next time I find a bottle of alcohol hidden on my ship, you're going to find yourself spending the night in vacuum. Is that a _dent_ on the _Phantom's_ hull? After I specifically told you _not_ to dent it? Keep your wandering eyes to yourself unless you want a black one. Did you really just kick my droid? Please don't talk to my ship that way; she's worth more than you are.

Etcetera.

Chopper had to admit that Kanan, to his credit, was fairly compliant with many of Hera's requests; she was training him well. He was proving to be a competent co-pilot and he kept Hera out of danger as much as possible, or shared the danger at least. He was argumentative and stubborn, but seemed to display many of the same biological indicators of romantic attraction that Hera did; the major difference being that he _was_ obvious about it, which Chopper found foolish. Hera Syndulla was not going to be won with such blundering tactics. He advised Kanan to that effect—many times—using the choicest of language to do so.

Even so, Chopper's attitude toward the human was softening minutely; he had very recently saved Hera's life, treating a head wound which could have proved terminal without immediate intervention. During her recovery, Jarrus exhibited utmost concern and diligence, displaying what Chopper could only describe as _tenderness_. A disgustingly sentimental designation, to be sure, but apt nonetheless. Jarrus had forfeited several of his own recharging cycles in order to keep Hera company and monitor her condition. For that, Chopper was grateful. Hera had done nothing but care for and maintain him for years; it seemed fitting that someone should do the same for her.

So when Kanan approached him for a favor concerning Hera, Chopper found himself willing to at least consider helping.

Aware that Hera's birthday just passed, Kanan was trying to identify her favorite meal and make a kind gesture of preparing it for her. Why he didn't just ask her himself, Chopper couldn't understand. Sentient behavior was truly bizarre. Still, the favor was ultimately for Hera, so he decided to lend his grudging assistance.

Mynock dumplings, he assured Kanan, were Hera's favorite meal.

Kanan—the pitiable fool—was no doubt aware that many Twi'leks considered mynock to be a delicacy. He thanked Chopper and went on his way, ignorant to the fact that Chopper had given him information with a one-to-one ratio of truth to lies.

Hera's favorite meal was indeed a variety of dumplings, but she couldn't stand mynock. Not the tiniest bit. Chopper had once watched a seven-year-old Hera and her father, The Hammer of Ryloth, stare each other down over her refusal to eat the mynock dish her mother had prepared; Hera had emerged the victor.

Chopper felt a small measure of guilt over giving information which would put Hera in an awkward situation, but he predicted that she, being the kind-hearted sentient she was, would make every attempt to eat the meal in order to spare Kanan's feelings. The _real_ discomfiture would be Kanan's if he realized that Hera hated mynock, and putting the man in uncomfortable situations was Chopper's favorite pastime. There was a marginal possibility that his interference would be discovered, but Chopper deemed it worth the risk, counting on the fact that Kanan would be too proud to admit he'd consulted a droid for help.

The two sentients usually ate their evening meal together around nineteen-hundred hours, so Chopper made sure to be in the galley at that time. Kanan had been quite busy preparing the meal and seemed to possess some culinary skill. Hera, working alone in the _Phantom_ all afternoon, was as yet unaware of his efforts. She walked into the galley, face and jumpsuit streaked with engine grease. Most sentients, Chopper knew, considered grease to be offensively dirty, but Kanan seemed to find it endearing. He smiled broadly as Hera entered the room.

"You're just in time," he said. It was an obvious statement, Chopper thought; they _always_ ate dinner at that time. Where else would Hera be?

"What's all this?" She sounded pleasantly surprised. Kanan fidgeted, suddenly nervous. He touched the back of his neck, an indicator of self-consciousness.

"I thought I'd try to fix a nice meal for your birthday," he said.

"That's so sweet of you, Kanan!"

 _Sweet?_ Chopper was concerned his plan was unravelling. He hadn't anticipated that anything about this interaction would tend toward flirtation, yet the smile on Hera's face was one of the brightest and most genuine Chopper had ever seen. He groaned inwardly.

"Well don't thank me yet," Kanan said, very nearly bashful. "You can reserve judgment until the first bite."

They sat at the table, plates served. "The dumplings smell delicious," Hera said, fork in hand. Chopper didn't understand why she was using a fork to eat food which could so easily be eaten with her fingers. How was handling a dumpling any different than handling greasy engine parts? With that thought, he almost distracted himself from the next part of the sentients' conversation.

"What kind of dumplings are we having?" She asked as the fork was already at her mouth.

"Mynock," Kanan answered, pride evident in his expression. "I know it's a favorite on Ryloth."

Hera's fork hesitated minutely and she smiled, no doubt to put Kanan at ease. "It certainly is," she said.

She finally put the fork in her mouth and started chewing. If she found the mynock to be repulsive as she had in times past, her countenance betrayed nothing. She took another bite, smiling at that blasted Kanan again, and continued to eat. Chopper noticed that although her facial expression was pleasantly arranged, Hera's free hand was clenched around the edge of the bench and her spine and shoulders were rigid. Her gaze shifted almost imperceptibly in his direction and he knew the game was about to be up.

"This is wonderfully prepared, Kanan," she said between bites. The tone of her voice was extremely pleasant, almost apologetically so. "Just like home."

Chopper marveled at how Hera had managed to compliment Kanan without lying to him.

Kanan himself was very evidently having trouble ingesting the dish, chewing and swallowing laboriously. "I'm glad you like it," he said, reaching for his glass of water.

Hera's fork sliced another dumpling in half, but did not transport it to her mouth. "I'm curious," she said, "where did you manage to find mynock?"

Chopper felt sure that if he were a sentient, he would be sweating nervously now.

"The market we visited yesterday," Kanan answered. He likewise speared a dumpling with his fork, but made no move to consume it.

"I had no idea there were mynocks in this sector!" Hera was unfailingly polite, as predicted. Next, a seemingly innocent query: "Did Chopper go with you?"

Kanan had given up eating. "Uh, yeah. Why?"

Chopper's internal gears seemed to slow to a crawl and he wondered if that was what the humanoid equivalent of panic felt like. Hera was definitely onto him; time to go. As succinctly as possible, he communicated a sudden need to go and run a diagnostic work-up on the _Phantom._ He rolled toward the door and was _so close_ to exiting when Hera stuck her foot out, blocking him. Her eyes shifted between him and Kanan.

"And he was with you the whole time?"

"Yes," Kanan answered, drawing out the word. "I'd never bought mynock meat before, so he—"

Hera held up a hand, interrupting. "Stop right there."

Kanan's expression was a muddle of confusion. "What's the matter?"

Hera's face indicated tightly bridled anger: her lips were in a thin line, eyebrows pulled together, nostrils flared. "Tell him, Chop."

She was using That Tone of voice. Chopper rocked back and forth on his struts, nervous, dispensing an excuse about cross-wired memory circuits; how was _he_ supposed to keep up with the dietary habits of a single Twi'lek?

" _Cross-wired!_ " Her voice was five and a half decibels louder than before. " _Something_ is." Her eyes narrowed and she turned to Kanan. "Did Chopper tell you I like mynock?"

"Yeah." The distress and embarrassment on Kanan's face filled Chopper with a modicum of glee, although he knew better than to show it.

Hera made a disgusted noise and got up, clearing the plates from the table. She shook her head, lekku twitching agitatedly, and addressed Kanan. "You obviously hate mynock and so do I. Always have."

Kanan shifted, crossing his arms over his chest. "Really," he said. Anger was slowly replacing embarrassment and the man's face was steadily turning an unbecoming shade of pink.

Chopper swiveled his dome back and forth between the two humanoids, both glaring at him. But _really,_ he wanted to know, why was _he_ being held responsible for Kanan being stupid enough to think mynock could be _anyone's_ favorite meal?

A well-practiced smack landed on top of his dome. Extending one of his manipulators, Chopper swung at his assailant, narrowly missing Hera's knee. He could tell by the positioning of her lips that she was about to start yelling.

"Shut up and get out of here before I let him dismantle you— _then_ you'll know what cross-wired feels like!"

Half-afraid the threat wasn't entirely empty, Chopper wasted no time removing himself from the galley. Since he was leaving anyway and Hera was already mad, he uttered a few sounds that would translate to Ryl, the Twi'lek language, instead of Basic. If she _insisted_ on choosinga mate, he demanded, _must_ it be this one?

Her wrath was unmistakable and perhaps even more forcible when expressed in her native tongue. Chopper noticed, though, that not a single word out of her mouth sounded anything like a denial. He was very curious about _that_ , but figured it was safest to wait a month or six before pressing the issue. He took a lap around the _Ghost_ and then crept silently back through the common room, peering curiously into the galley after his auditory sensors registered the most peculiar sound.

Kanan was still sitting at the table and Hera was sitting on top of it, swinging her legs over the edge and laughing— _laughing_ like Chopper hadn't ever heard her laugh before. She looked, for once, as happy and carefree as other females of a comparable age. She'd never looked like that before she met Kanan.

Chopper decided it suited her very much. If that meant he needed to suffer Kanan's indefinite existence on the ship for her sake, then so be it. But then he noticed that Kanan's hand settled on the tabletop very near Hera's hip, fingertips _just_ brushing against the fabric of her trousers. Her head tilted almost coquettishly as she listened to Kanan talk and more than once, her hand touched his arm. The worst part: neither of them seemed to be aware of the flirtation. Chopper had observed a lot of sentient behavior and he detected between Hera and Kanan no trace of coyness or pretense; not this time. The moment they were sharing was genuine and probably fleeting, but it was touching.

Chopper was thoroughly disgusted.


	6. Why Hera Was Crying

A/N: Yeah, idk what to tell you about this. It's fluff? But like, not very well executed fluff? And I botched the ending because I'm really BAD at endings. Bear with me.

* * *

Why Hera Was Crying

 _Time Elapsed: Thirty-Eight Months_

The organics' designated term for this manner of behavior, Chopper believed, was _crying._

Hera was crying.

Hera.

 _Crying._

It was so violently unusual that Chopper didn't know what to do or what to think. He'd only once before seen her cry in public—he knew that she considered any such display occurring in front of one or more droid or organic to be _public_ —and that was on the day her mother died. Crying seemed to be an acceptable and understandable method through which organics expressed and processed their feelings of grief over the loss of a loved one.

Chopper didn't understand why it was happening now. He wondered if perhaps her reaction would have been less severe if her last recharging cycle hadn't occurred more than forty-eight hours ago. They didn't even know for sure that Kanan Jarrus _was_ dead, so why was Hera crying at all? Admittedly, the odds were not stacked well in favor of his survival. He was supposed to have infiltrated the supply depot, picked up _one_ crate, and come back to the ship with it. Hera was supposed to wait in the cockpit, ready to take off immediately upon Kanan's return so they could deliver their payload to the one they called Hutt. It was supposed to be an hour-long, easy job.

 _Supposed to._

These things seldom ever worked out as smoothly as the organics planned them to. The first hint of trouble came not fifteen minutes into the whole thing, when a freak malfunction rendered their coms useless. Chopper had patched in to the Imperial com frequencies then, to monitor activity in the area. No mention of anyone trying to steal anything, so it seemed Kanan was in the clear.

And then something blew up.

 _That's_ when Hera started to get tense. She didn't say anything, but she listened intently to the radio chatter. The muscles around her mouth were tight and bio-scanners indicated her heart rate was elevated slightly, but she still seemed in control. Worried, but not _too_ worried yet. Then the Imperials reported a tall, dark-headed human male fleeing the explosion site, pursued closely by a squad of storm troopers. He gave them a good chase around the city for nearly a half hour. Hera, as she listened, was alternately cursing under her breath and muttering _Come on, Kanan, come on._

And then the stormtroopers caught up with the unidentified human male, and shot him. Chopper and Hera heard the blaster bolts, heard a muffled scream, heard the squad leader confirm the kill.

And _that_ was the exact moment Hera started this… _crying._

Crying. The verb was correct, but perhaps not strong enough. It needed a modifier. Chopper searched his databanks for just the right one.

Hysterical.

Hera was crying _hysterically._

It was the most alarming thing that Chopper had ever seen and he was truly concerned not just for her mental and emotional state, but her physical well-being. He projected that if her respirations did not return to normal _very soon_ , she would hyperventilate and pass out. The organics, if Chopper was not mistaken, called this _fainting._

Hera Syndulla.

 _Fainting._

Not today.

He wheeled over to her and he emulated a behavior he'd seen Kanan and Hera exhibit toward each other on multiple occasions. He carefully placed one of his manipulators on her knee and in a series of low, soothing whistles and warbles, he communicated a query.

[What do you need?]

She looked up at him, feverishly wiping tears away from her eyes, which really only smeared them across already-wet cheeks. "W-w-what?"

[What do you need?] He repeated this patiently as he could.

"I-I-I don't _know_ —Kanan is _gone_ —they—they—" She had to stop as more sobs wracked her body and she pressed a hand over her eyes. Her lips trembled when she spoke again. "Ch-chop, w-what am I going t-to do?"

This was what organics referred to as _heartbreak._ [I'm sorry, Hera.] And, much to his surprise, he really was.

For about thirty seconds.

"Hera! _Gods_ —what's wrong?"

Her head shot up at the sound of Kanan's voice and, to Chopper's eternal horror, she started crying _even harder_ as she jumped to her feet and all but threw herself into his embrace. Caught off guard, he stumbled back against the cockpit door, wrapping his arms tightly around her. For a moment, he seemed unsure of what to do. He whispered something to Hera and stroked the back of her neck and then her lekku, over and over. Chopper would have decried the vulgarity of displaying such an intimate gesture if it didn't seem to have a calming effect on Hera almost immediately. "Hey, hey, hey, shhh," Kanan intoned softly. "Tell me what's wrong. What is it?"

His voice was calm but his eyes were _full_ of panic as he looked at Chopper. [She thought you were dead.] The droid gave a grudging explanation.

" _What!"_ Kanan took a deep breath. "What do you mean, 'dead?'"

Chopper squawked his aggravation. [What do you mean, what do I mean? Imperial coms—]

"We tapped Imperial coms," Hera explained, pulling her face from Kanan's chest. His shirt was wet with tears now. Her eyes were red and raw. "We heard them apprehend and kill a human man matching your description and I thought—I thought—"

"You thought it was me," he finished, _finally_ understanding. She nodded and Chopper saw fresh tears spill over. If she started crying again, he'd throw himself out the airlock.

[Make her _stop!_ I don't understand how she was crying over you in the first place, and now you've made it _worse!_ ]

"Would you get out!" Kanan delivered a swift kick to the base of one of Chopper's struts, and the astromech would have been all too happy to strike back if only Hera wasn't in the way. As it was, the Twi'lek's turmoil had strained his processors, and he wanted time away from the sentients and their emotional garbage. He was all too happy to let someone else try and take care of the crying _._ Chopper was also—though he would rather deactivate than admit it—very, very glad that Hera wasn't going to have her heart broken after all.

* * *

She knew she should have gone with him. She _knew_ it. She could have had Chopper stay with the ship. She could have gone with Kanan to that supply depot. It would have been safer. They were better, anyway, when they worked in tandem. They were two halves of a whole. And she shouldn't have agreed to him going alone. Not because he couldn't do it, or because she felt the need to micro-manage. But the whole point of having a partner, a co-pilot, a best friend, was that you didn't _have_ to be alone.

Only, they couldn't seem to be _together_ , either. Not in the way they kept dancing around, had been dancing around for more than a year. It had been bad lately, for no reason in particular. There was nothing but electricity between them, which sometimes sparked and caught fire in the worst way possible. Hera gnawed her lip as Chopper patched into the Imperial coms channels. _She shouldn't have let Kanan go alone._ Not when they'd been fighting that morning. They resolved it—kind of—before he went out on the mission, but Hera still felt uneasy knowing the rift had been there. She wanted him back, and she wanted him safe so they could—could what?

Her eyes were gritty and ever so slightly out of focus. She rubbed them viciously, trying to force them back to working properly. Dimly, she was aware that she'd had only three hours of consecutive sleep in about as many days and that her eyes were no longer going to cooperate with her. Her body was reaching the limit of what it could handle. Her mind was almost there. Only anxiety and adrenaline were keeping her sharp now, and she had an excess of both at the moment; she'd heard an explosion and she _hoped_ Kanan had caused it and not been caught in it.

She listened tensely as the Imperials scrambled to figure out what happened. Her pulse spiked when they identified a suspect, a dark-headed human male nearly two meters tall. "Come on, Kanan," she muttered. It didn't occur to her to wonder _why_ he'd set off an explosion. All she cared about was that he made it back safely—

" _Suspect cornered—all units fire!"_

She jumped to her feet, listening in abject horror as the stormtroopers fired over and _over_. Nausea gripped her when she heard a strangled cry and the unmistakable sound of a body crumpling. It took her several moments to realize that it was _her_ — _she_ had cried out, _she_ was on the ground. Hard, rough sobs ripped at her throat and her body was shaking and she couldn't make it stop, she couldn't catch her breath.

Kanan was dead.

He was dead and she felt like she was breaking from the inside out. She shouldn't have let him go alone. She should have been there. She should have been there. She should have been there.

Chopper was concerned; he was trying to _comfort_ her, for kriff's sake, and that in itself told her she was spiraling completely out of control. Hera _hated_ feeling out of control, but she didn't know what to do or how to begin to process all of this. Kanan was dead. Her _best friend_ , her confidante, the person she trusted most in the galaxy. The man she loved. He was dead.

She tried to wipe the tears away from her eyes, but they were coming too fast. She kept a hand over them, trying to separate herself from reality. _What am I going to do?_

"Hera! Gods—what's wrong?"

Her head snapped up immediately and the sound of Kanan's voice, the sound of her name coming from his lips, undid her completely.

She was up and in his arms in an instant, still crying and completely relieved and happy and exhausted. She buried her face in his chest and breathed him in, relished the feeling of his arms tightly around her. "I'm here," he whispered. "I'm here." He ran his fingers on the back of her neck and he stroked her lekku with a gentle and practiced touch. The simple contact set her trembling even as she started to calm down. He was talking to Chopper and she could _feel_ the sound of his voice resonate through her.

"We heard them apprehend and kill a human man matching your description and I thought—I thought—" Her voice was raw and weak, and she found herself unable to finish the sentence.

His eyes went wide and then his jaw tightened. "You thought it was me."

She nodded and she felt new tears begin to well in her eyes, much to Chopper's very vocal dismay. "Kanan," she said after the droid wheeled out. She wrapped her fingers around his collar. "Kanan, I know we haven't been seeing eye to eye on this, but we have to take on more crew—we _have_ to. We can't keep—we can't keep working like this—no sleep and just the two of us to pull a job—"

"I know."

She barely heard him. "We _need_ help, Kanan. It's getting too dangerous—"

"Hera, I _know._ " He sighed. "Tonight was a wake up call."

Her mind was numb. It was starting to dawn on her that he looked just as run down as she felt. Fatigue settled heavily under his eyes, his tunic was streaked with dirt and sweat, and his hair had worked its way loose and was falling around his shoulders. "What happened out there?"

He shook his head. "I'll tell you all about it tomorrow."

She wound her arms around his neck. "I'm so glad you're okay, love. And I'm _sorry_ about earlier—"

"Don't," he said, mouth against her jaw. "Let's go to bed, huh? Get some sleep."

She nodded as she pulled from his embrace. "Stay with me?" He nodded and his eyes burned into hers. Force, she loved those eyes. She loved _him_. And she needed him. She brushed her knuckles on his jaw and he dipped his head just a fraction, leaning into her touch. Without hesitation, she pressed her lips to his and he responded by kissing her gently. It thrilled her head to toe, but she didn't _want_ to be kissed gently. She knotted her fingers in his hair, pressing their bodies so close that she could feel his heartbeat as well as her own. She caught his lower lip between her teeth and was satisfied to hear a soft sound of surprise in the back of his throat. His breath hitched and his fingers dug into her waist, wanting her just as much as she wanted him. And then, with some effort, he pulled away.

"Hera," he said unevenly, breathing hard, "after everything, _everything_ we went through today, maybe—"

She knew he was probably right, but she didn't care. She stopped his mouth with hers, and by the way his hands fell low on her hips, she could tell he wouldn't try to pull away again.

* * *

Kanan wanted to kriffing _kill_ whatever kriffing _idiot_ thought it was a good idea to blow up the office block across from that Imperial supply depot. Stupid, stupid, _stupid._ He didn't even have time to think about how close he'd been to getting caught in the explosion himself; there were too many stormtroopers converging too fast. He moved through alleyways and along rooftops, blending in with the night. He felt more than annoyed that he couldn't com Hera to update her. As much as he did _not_ want to hear her gripe about this now-botched job, he felt exposed without her. And he hated that things had been…off between them.

He circled around the city until he was absolutely sure he hadn't been followed, then he returned to the _Ghost_. He knew something was wrong before he even stepped foot on the ship, and by the time he hit the ramp and heard her torrential sobbing, he was running. The idea of her being _that_ upset set him completely on edge. It both gratified and rankled him to find out that he, inadvertently, had been the cause of her distress.

He was kicking himself now, because it all could have been avoided. He'd known it was a bad idea to try and pull this job without her. He should have aborted the entire mission the moment the coms went down. Still, there was one upside to all of this:

They were wrapped up in each other, arms and legs tightly wound. The bedsheets, tangled beyond usefulness, slipped to the floor unheeded. It had all started out innocently enough. Kanan held overwrought Hera until the last of her sobs quieted, the last tear fell, and her trembling stopped. Both of them exhausted in body if not in mind, he suggested going to sleep, and she readily assented. He'd assumed she'd want to spend the night in the same bed, but it never once crossed his mind that she'd kiss him the way she did: her hands in his hair, her lips insistent against his, so full of _desire._ He placed his hands on her shoulders and they parted just long enough for him to suggest maybe, _maybe_ now wasn't the best time, considering everything that had happened today—and then she kissed him like that again, and then he kissed her back, and then—

And then.

She was asleep now, resting for the first time in days. Kanan was nearly numb with exhaustion himself, but it wasn't often he got to have Hera this close, and he wanted to savor it. They were headed to Lothal tomorrow—some place he'd never even heard of. He hadn't been paying particular attention when Hera told him what the mission was there, but he could tell by how her eyes glittered that she was excited about it. The determined set of her shoulders told him there was a _lot_ of work to do on Lothal, so he might as well settle into the idea. That was fine. He'd certainly rather be stuck on some backwater planet with Hera than wandering the galaxy without her.

His arm was falling asleep, so he shifted slightly. The motion was enough to wake Hera for a moment, and she looked at him through half-open eyes. He kissed her forehead and she smiled. "We're okay?" Her words were thick and barely coherent.

"We're always okay." He watched her lids flutter shut and he closed his own eyes, ready to sink into sleep. Tomorrow they'd be back to work, ready to thwart the Empire on Lothal one shady job at a time. He figured in another few months they'd have another meltdown like today's, a fight about _them_ , and maybe that would always be the cycle. But tonight they were just Kanan and Hera, and he liked that version of them the best.

* * *

A/N: Honestly, I think I should have ended it after the bit with just Chopper's POV but, you know, Kanera. Now, y'all be honest. The kissing stuff…too awkward? too smutty? Like, I feel super weird writing a make-out sesh involving _cartoon characters on a kids' show_ , but I mean, almost the entire fanbase is adults, right?


End file.
